De La Salle Head Coach Justin Martineau takes a time-out in the fourth quarter in Thursday night's game against Bonnabel. (Danielle)

De La Salle and Bonnabel are quite familier foes, having already already met twice this season, with Bonnabel winning both times.

So when De La Salle entered the gym Thursday 30 minutes late, De La Salle Coach Justin Martineau felt his team might be flustered and ill-prepared to pull out a victory.

"We were prepared for Bonnabel during the first two games and lost," he said. "And it's ironic becuase tonight we show up late and are probably the least prepared to play well and get a win--and that's what we did."

The Cavaliers, led by junior Rene Causey's 23 points, showed no ill-effects from their late arrival and pulled out a 50-38 victory.

“We were sloppy tonight, we had a lot of turnovers, but I’ll take the win," Causey said. They beat us two times this year already and I’m just happy we could pull it off."

The first half was a hard fought defensive effort by both teams. The Bruins (3-3) defense caused the Cavaliers (6-5) to commit six of their eight first-half turnovers in the first quarter. But the Bruins didn’t fare much better against the Cavaliers’ committing six first half turnovers of their own.

Both teams battled hard inside in the in the first half, with the Bruins outrebounding the Cavaliers 12 to 11. The Bruins’ Andriel Moss had five rebounds and all of her three blocked shots in the first half, and finished with four points and eight rebounds.

Bonnabel had a 22-19 lead at the half, but the Cavaliers came out after intermission ready play. Causey hit back-to-back 3-pointers, sparking an 8-0 run, which gave them the lead for the first time at 25-22.

The Bruins shot just 1-of-13 from the field in third quarter, and with the Cavaliers shooting going 5-of-6 from the field and 50 percent from the foul line, they had a comfortable lead entering the final period.

“We couldn’t make our shots tonight and we had too many turnovers,” Bonnabel guard Trieshia Jackson, who finished with 12 points, said. “De La Salle proved they knew us tonight, they were ready and we weren’t.”

Bonnabel fought hard to comeback in the fourth, shooting 5-of-9 from the field, but it could never quite close the gap. Meanwhile, the Cavaliers shot 9-of-11.

“We’re a young ball club, mostly sophomores and freshman, so we’re going to make mistakes,” Bonnabel Coach Vincent Buffa said. “De La Salle is a good team, they have experience and each girl knows their role on the team.”

“I’m very impressed with our girls tonight,” Martineau said. “We only played six girls tonight and we have several injuries, but we played hard and we were ready for Bonnabel.”